It’s time to crown the king of real estate blogs. The final pairing of competitors in the VARbuzz Real Estate Blog Brawl pits #2 seed FosterCityBlog.com vs. #4 seed TheXBroker.com.

FosterCityBlog.com is the work of Jim Minkey, a REALTOR with RE/MAX Today, specializing in Foster City and San Carlos real estate. Jim has implored his readership for several rounds to get out and vote for him, and it has certainly paid off. He has knocked out some very formidable opponents along the way, including two Virginia bloggers with what you might consider home court advantage. His victories over RealDiaBlog.com, MyTucsonBlog.com and VaRealEstateTalk.com have all come on a wide margin.

Jeff Corbett, The X Broker, a mortgage expert and former real estate broker from Texas is the challenger. Along the way, Jeff has put the beat down on BlueRoof, #1 seed RealEstateZebra.com, and #2 seed MyCharlottesvilleBlog.com. As you can see, he hasn’t been intimidated by Virginia real estate blogs, with two of his last three victories coming at the expense of two talented agents in the Charlottesville area. Jeff also hasn’t been afraid to mobilize his readers, and while his margin of victory has been slimmer, the results are the same.

So, now it’s a battle of two titans. Cast your vote by 11:59 p.m. EDT on Monday, March 31. The winner will be announced on April Fools Day.

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This is a repost of something I did on NRVLiving.Typepad.com earlier this afternoon … I thought it appropriate for VARBuzz.com, as maybe it’s a reminder of what our role really IS in the transaction?

Mariana Wagner posted the following video on her site yesterday and it gave me a chuckle, ’cause it reminded me of when this played regularly on TV and - without fail - I’d laugh every time then, as well! (I love the arson comment) The timing of her post is fitting, as well, as I’ve been thinking about a situation I ran up against in the last couple of weeks that I’ve wanted to share. First, the video:

Why doesn’t the real estate industry have a positive reputation in the public? I had a customer tell me - half jokingly - on the phone the other day, “you guys are just a step above used car salesman”. I kid not, she was not referring to anyone on my Team but the comment was pointed, all the same. How did we grow into that reputation? Here’s one reason:

I’m working with some folks who are buying a home for their college student son to live in while he’s here at VT. It’s a common practice here in the New River Valley, probably 20 percent of my business every year. We’ve been working through the winter to prepare them for buying their first investment property, and as we’ve headed into the spring the market’s heated up and they’ve gotten more serious. Last Tuesday, we finally wrote an offer. It was a townhouse in a neighborhood they really liked, and the house needed work - it’s actually the second set of clients I’ve had that have tried to buy this house. It’s been on and off the market for over a year as the owner has tried - unsuccessfully - to sell it, and the tenants he has in place have not helped. They’ve trashed it, to the point it needs $15,000 worth of repairs and cleaning once they’ve moved out. The last time I had clients who wrote an offer, we built in the cost of the repairs to our offer and made an offer nine percent off of list price. The owner countered within 24 hours at full list price, and the offer died there.

This time, we made an identical offer, now at 10 percent off of list price. I live in this neighborhood - I know these homes, and I know the value of this one as it is right now. We submitted the offer last Wednesday via email, and a follow-up phone call was made to the listing agent. Voicemail… I left a message. That night, nearly eight hours later, I called the listing agent to see if he had reviewed the offer, and he informed me he was out of town and would look at it when he got back that night. Okay - the next day came and went, no word from him. Friday morning, still no word, and despite repeated phone calls I heard nothing through the weekend. NOTHING, not even a confirmation that he had seen the offer. Sunday night, he finally picks up his phone and says that they are waiting to see if another offer comes in, and they don’t want to counter.

Now I’m upset. First, I’m upset that I didn’t advise my clients to put a time limit on the offer to ensure a swift response. Even more than that, I’m upset that neither the agent nor his client have taken the opportunity to provide a professional courtesy to my clients, informing them of their intentions. If they want to sit on the offer, fine - just tell us this. When I asked why they hadn’t even acknowledged receipt of the offer, the agent responded, “Okay, if you want a counter then we’re countering at full price.” He made that statement without consulting his client. Is he in a position to make that determination? Likely not, but it could be argued that a full price counter is in his client’s best interests.

The resolution of all of this? My clients pulled their offer and immediately - within minutes - and made an offer on a similar, more expensive home. The other home? Still on the market, and will continue to be there for a while, I’m sure.

So why do we as real estate agents feel it’s appropriate to neglect an offer, fail to deliver it in a timely fashion and then make decisions without consulting our client? What sense of power have we created in our minds that allows us to own our client’s decisions? When did the control shift out of the hands of the buyers and the sellers, and in to the hands of agents?
It hasn’t, and it never did. We took it. We’ve tried for so long to control the transaction, to pull the strings in the background. My clients were at the mercy of another agent’s actions, and decided they would take control. I’m glad they did, and I suspect you have plenty of clients who would do the same. My reminder in all of this? I work FOR my clients, they’re not working for me. My role should be one of consultation, of putting the pieces in place for them to make informed, quantitative decisions. That’s the changing face of real estate, not a puppeteer pulling the strings.

I look forward to helping these clients close on this new home …

Photo Credit: Dialaphone & Appraisal News

“Each of us carries around a crippling disadvantage: we know and probably cherish our product. After all, we live with it day in and day out. But that blinds us to why the customer may hate it or love it. Our customers see the product through an entirely different set of lenses. Education is not the answer; listening and adapting is.” – Tom Peters, in Thriving on Chaos

I know there’s no blanket answer to this question, but I have to ask:

When your name is hyperlinked where do you want it to go?

While composing blogs and articles for e-newsletters sometimes we mention members by name. When this happens, I like to insert a hyperlink so readers can contact or find more information on the quoted or mentioned member; BUT, choosing which hyperlink can be a bit confusing and up until now I’ve used the eanie-meanie… method. The great thing about VAR members is they are EVERYWHERE online, but when you’re quoting or mentioning them how do you decide where the links should go? You tell me.

Active rain page? Facebook profile? Personal Website? Myspace? Broker’s site? Youtube? or Do you like being linked to at all? If you had a choice, where would the one click attached to your name go?
-Jovan

The Williamsburg Association of REALTORS plans their day of visits to their legislators in the General Assembly Building.

Last night I was exhausted but too excited to sleep, that’s what VAR Legislative & Education Conference does to you! My head was spinning with ideas shared, “friends” met for first time face to face, RPAC, so I was up late in the night writing….

Wow - I’m just wrapping up day two of four here in Richmond at our VAR Legislative & Education Conference.
Click here for Full Schedule of events.
I’m really too tired to be writing this blog but also too excited not to write it.

Day one was a long “1/2 day”.

My first session was on Policy Manuals taught by VAR Legal Guru: Lem Marshall. While geared mostly to the Broker Office poffice manuals, I took many notes about things that also would relate to our Local Association Manual.

Virginia Managers Council hosted Broker Roundtables - speed dating style. 4 tables each with a “date” or host with a pre-selected topic of discussion. Topics included “How to keep a positive attiutude in the office” (my personal office favorite method is to hold a purring cat), Operating a Virtual Office, Business Planning for Office & Agents & Managing the Brokerage Books. More details to come in a later post.

Day 2 has been a full day. This is the day that REALTORS storm the Hill. Morning Brief on important issues & Bills currently in the house & senate then the march or bus ride to the hill for “face time” with your representatives. While I attended the briefing, I decided to take the morning to meet with our local association executive & make plans for our roll out to membership of our new proposed Strategic Plan. Then to meet with Harrisonburg’s Association 2007 President. The exchange of information & spirit of cooperation is profound. Sallye - a licensed VAR Instructor offered to help with some education programs being developed.

RPAC Awards Luncheon and wrap up of the Day on the HIll. VAR’s is the second largest PAC in the state and a well respected for being the voice of property right issues. RPAC goal for this year is lofty & was kicked off with quite the performance by “THE RPAC DIVAS” - you really had to be there for that one!

IMAG - Information Management Advoacy Group. This is my first year on one of the AGs, I must say I am impressed with the depth of knowledge of both the volunteers & the staff liasons involved in IMAG. (I’m very proud to see 3 members of my VLA 2007 class members at the table.) Ben Martin, CAE Communications Director unleashed the social media bug on VAR last fall. VARbuzz.com, VAR Facebook Group, VAR Linkedin Group are all part of the official VAR social media plan. Jovan Hackley, the new Marketing Manager is sharp! look for the new “TOP 10″ postcard - (download the pdf here). Just wait until you see the new member plan he is working on! I’d be remiss not to mention Lisa Noon, VP Marketing & Communications & Scott Rogers, Chair of IMAG.

A side note: There are a large number of Virginian REALTORS that participate in social media conversations on a daily basis with a national “group” of REALTORS. We share market info, tech tools & advice, send & recieve referrals, talk about our day, share jokes and troubles - we consider ourselves friends BUT many have never met face to face. Today several of us met face to face for the first time. Pretty cool experience even if I am the old lady of the bunch! Make sure to read:
A Cynic Converted … “Hello. My name is Jeremy, and I was a cynic.”

As if that’s not enough next was a video blog interview with Ben Martin talking with Tony Arko, Technology Chair DAAR & myself about the use of the Ning platform of social media as a communication tool for our local REALTOR associations. We’ve been sharing information, tips, tools but had never met in person. Boy do I have some great ideas for our new Information Management Committe & their website project!

A quick visit to the I-81 Corridor meeting. The AEs had a few questions & input for IMAG new member project & that wrapped up the daylight hours of the day.

A fast run to drop off computer, then on to the Legisaltive Reception to rub elbows with our elected officials. AND rub elbows is the right term, the pre-registration numbers for this year indicate this will be a record breaking attendence.

Finally, dinner with 3 members of VLA 2007. Then back to the hotel to prepare for tomorrow.

First meeting tomorrow - 7:30 am. Night all! I can’t wait to meet Michael Wurzer, FlexMLS, who will speaking at the MLS Forum!

Note: this is cross posted on Musings from the Valley of Virginia

Appears in January/February Commonwealth Magazine (by Matthew Ferrara)

Working a boom real estate market is not so hard; with a heartbeat and a license, many inexperienced agents beat the odds. But sticking around through tough markets requires serious players. The competition will be well-trained, well-financed and most likely, well-versed in the technology that keeps them competitive.

That’s why technology matters more than ever. When markets tighten, competitive advantages are critical. Enhanced technology skills provide competitive advantages across every segment of your business. Every one of these areas can benefit from technology that saves time, cuts costs and expands opportunity to maximize the market. And with agent and broker incomes dropping with the market, technology mastery becomes more critical than ever.

If you’re planning on sticking around, it’s time for your technology to start making a difference. Here are four areas you can focus on right away:

1. Customer acquisition. One of the greatest expenses for real estate professionals is the cost to find new sellers and buyers. Let’s face it: you’re never going to cold call prospects. Your postcard marketing is a passive-aggressive waste of time. And your print ads aren’t going to entice buyers. It’s time to unleash the web. All those for sale by owners online are your best prospects. Start looking them up on their websites and emailing them. They have already made the mental leap to sell and have an 88 percent likelihood of ultimately working with a real estate agent. Talk to them the way they are telling you they want to hear from you: by email. And since these people will also be buyers, the same technique applies if you’re hunting for customers. Use the web (and forget about them coming to your website – which they can’t find.)

(more…)

Check out our top 10 real estate blogs

All blogging, like real estate, is local. Not necessarily in a geographical sense, but local in a sense of closely related ideas and common concerns. And while the best blog for one REALTOR® is not necessarily best for the next, there are a few blog sites where everyone can find and contribute REALTOR®-relevant, useful information on any topic you choose. Whether your interest is finding new customers, sharing or finding information on an issue you face, or just figuring out what blogging is all about, these sites are a great way to get started:

1. ActiveRain.com – Join over 60,000 real estate professionals in discussing current happenings and important issues in the real estate industry. Create your own profile and your blog comes with it. The only thing you need to bring are your ideas.
2. AgentGenius.com – No one blogger is at the center of this online meeting of minds. Posts are a community product developed by agents from across the country, including one of Virginia’s own blogstars. Find out who it is by visiting and clicking “G-Spot” and while you’re there, browse around for the newest approaches to real estate, technology product reviews and application of the next generation of the internet, Web 2.o, to the real estate profession.
3. Inman.com – Real estate information and technology meet to produce one of the web’s most accessed real estate blog sites at Inman.com. Viewed 7 million times per month, Inman provides users the opportunity to network while accessing relevant information from 250 newspapers and 50,000 websites daily. Don’t worry, you don’t have to read it all, but you might want to.
4. RealEstateTomato.com – This site’s main goal is to make REALTORS® more successful; and it does just that. Real estate tomato provides everything a new real estate blogger or e-marketer wants to know, in addition to a few things that you hadn’t thought of.
5. Bloodhoundblog.com – Get an insider’s view of the mortgage industry, talk screen-to-screen with investors and read and comment on topics that attract real estate professionals from all over the U.S., all on the provocative Bloodhound Blog.
6. RSSPieces.com – Want to learn to blog? Podcast? Market? Or optimize a search engine? Here’s a site that will teach you for free.
7. MyTechOpinion.com – This blog is a little more focused than some others, but no less useful. Visit this site to get the inside scoop on how technology is enhancing real estate and provide feedback or get information on how these innovations affect you.
8. RealtyBlogging.com – This site doesn’t receive as much traffic as other general real estate blog sites, which makes it easier to navigate in most cases. The big names in real estate blogging can be found here, but without the visual congestion of some other sites.
9. NARblog1.realtors.org/mvtype/narinthenews/ Stay in touch with what’s happening at NAR on this blog. Many other sites will talk about NAR’s position on issues, but this is the site for those that want to go straight to the source.
10. RealBlogging.com – Read more than 40 categories of real estate blogs on any topic from advertising and marketing to specialty services and fraud prevention at this site. This real estate community has resources for everyone, from experts looking to talk to other experts all the way down to novices and prospective professionals in need of a real estate glossary.

A look inside the hard drive of “Real Estate Zebra” Daniel Rothamel

by Valerie Hubbard

If it was 1825, Daniel Rothamel probably would be the guy packing up the wagons and the horses to lead an expedition west. But since it’s 2008, he’s blazing his trails on the internet.

Rothamel, a REALTOR® with Strong Team REALTORS® in the Charlottesville area, began his real estate career in 2003 after graduating from the University of Delaware. In late 2006, he and his wife, Kari, and her mother, Patsy Strong, opened their own real estate brokerage.

Daniel began blogging in 2005 as a way of informing his clients and customers about the Charlottesville area. He eventually combined his passion for real estate with his passion for basketball offi ciating and launched RealEstateZebra.com — the referee’s uniform has black and white stripes. Get it?

Daniel views social media as a powerful tool that serves to strengthen the relationship between real estate agents and their customers and clients. He firmly believes that social media can improve your business and at the same time enhance your profession.

With his abundant experience and enthusiasm for virtual social networking, we decided to poke around inside his hard drive, so-to-speak, and find out the why, what and how of Daniel Rothamel’s secrets to marketing real estate in 2008 and beyond…

VAR: When and how did you fi rst get involved with social media?
Rothamel: In real estate, I’ve been blogging about a year and a half. I started doing it as a way of connecting the local community, in Fluvanna County. That was my original blog’s purpose. I didn’t really have a good plan for it. I thought it would be a good place for people to come together and share stuff, but it didn’t really take off. So then I thought maybe it would work with real estate, and I started a blog called cvillearearealestate.com. It went well and started taking off after a few months. I was really getting into it, but the name wasn’t catchy enough for me. My wife suggested that I call myself the ‘real estate zebra,’ and I thought that sounded pretty cool. So that’s how I started realestatezebra.com. Once I got into it, I realized that this was really powerful stuff, and I needed to really be utilizing it.

VAR: What types of social media are you employing now as marketing tools and how effective have they been? (more…)

New technologies raise new legal issues

by Blake Hegeman, VAR’s Associate Counsel

The expanded use of online marketing and social media within the REALTOR® community has created new and exciting opportunities. However, its use has raised novel legal issues. Here’s how to protect your business when using these new tools.

The Code of Ethics and online advertising

The internet is a cost-efficient and effective way to market your brokerage services. It is becoming the norm for many REALTORS® to maintain sophisticated and informative websites to reach customers and other agents. While VAR encourages its members to use this medium, we also caution you to adhere strictly to the rules in the Code of Ethics pertaining to advertising.

This year, NAR amended several sections of the Code to account for the increasing use of the Internet. Below are highlights of those additions (found in Articles 9, 12, and 15):

• The name of the REALTOR® firm and state of licensure must be disclosed in a reasonable and readily apparent manner when advertising listed property on its website or a REALTOR® or affiliated non-member licensee’s website.
• Information on REALTOR® websites must be current, and if it is out of date, the information must be removed immediately.
• REALTOR® websites must present a true picture in their advertising, including URLs and domain names. The following are strictly prohibited:
  • Engaging in deceptive or unauthorized framing of real estate brokerage websites;
  • Manipulating (e.g., presenting content developed by others) listing content in any way that produces a deceptive or misleading result; or
  • Deceptively using metatags, keywords or other devices/methods to direct, drive, or divert Internet traffic, or to otherwise mislead consumers.
• REALTORS® intending to share or sell consumer information gathered via the Internet must disclose that possibility in a reasonable and readily apparent manner.
• The duty to avoid making false or misleading statements about competitors’ businesses and practices includes the duty not to knowingly or recklessly repeat, retransmit, or republish false or misleading statements made by others using electronic means.
• When assisting or enabling a client or customer in establishing a contractual relationship (e.g., listing and representation agreements, purchase agreements, leases, etc.) electronically, REALTORS® must make reasonable efforts to explain the nature and disclose the specific terms of the contractual relationship being established.

Using blogs to connect with the community

Blogs raise a number of legal issues that haven’t been thoroughly reviewed by the courts. (more…)

high-tech investment is still paying off

by Valerie Hubbard

Two years ago, Jim Duncan of Century 21 Manley Associates in Charlottesville and Merv Forney of Choice3 Realty Group in Leesburg were on the cutting edge.

As two of the first Virginia REALTORS® to explore web logs or blogs in their real estate practice, the two lauded the marketing and educational benefits just waiting to be tapped with this new technology tool in a feature article on blogging published in the march-april 2006 issue of Commonwealth magazine.

“Technology is moving at an incredible rate,” Duncan was quoted saying.

Indeed. Just like dogs who live at a faster pace than we humans, technology also laps us many times in the span of a year. It’s as if its evolutionary speedometer is set somewhere around “warp.”

so we wanted to know – are Duncan and Forney keeping up? you bet they are.

After only three years in real estate, Forney – a former senior executive with the technology firm EDS – has exponentially increased exposure to his blog askmerv.choice3realty.com. Just Google “Northern Virginia real estate” and see what shows up at the top of the list of results.

“My blog,” Forney says.

“For about the past 12 months I’ve been getting 100 percent of my business from the blog, and (more…)